After a little over a year of waiting, the orthopedic physical therapy residency program at the University of Michigan Health System has received credentialing from the American Physical Therapy Association.
Michigan is now one of more than 200 credentialed programs in the United States and more programs are being added every day. We are one of two programs in the state of Michigan.
According to Andrew Marsh, P.T., the Orthopedic Residency director at the Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, having a nationally recognized and accredited program will allow the University to further the profession of orthopedics in terms of creating more and better medical models that have greater depths than what currently exists.
Unlike others across the country, the program at the University of Michigan Health System is part-time and lasts 18 months, which is longer than others.
“The fact that it’s a part time program allows the residents to work part time, so they’re not without some type of paycheck and insurance coverage,” said Marsh.
According to Marsh, the APTA mentioned that the Michigan residency did significantly more training than any other program to date in terms of mentoring and one-on-one experience.
The program at the University of Michigan Health system is special because not only of a focus on specific guidelines set forth by the APTA, but also the unique hallmark of the Michigan program, using three different paradigms to treat orthopedics. The first is a motion based assessment for treatment, the second is an osteopathic paradigm, and third is a Norwegian based OMPT manual-based therapy approach.
“We take the guidelines set forth by the APTA, but we also apply them to the three different paradigms on how to treat over the orthopedic field,” Marsh said.
